30 Day Boyfriend

What had once been a silly little bet between two eighteen year old's was now something entirely real. While she was shy with guys, he was outgoing with girls. While she thought he couldn't date a girl for thirty days, he was determined to prove her...

"I want.. I want to be a lawyer or.. something big. Something that'll pay my bills until I'm ready to go into a retirement home. My dream is basic. I just want to be successful. My cat? He's orange. Huge. Fat. Boring. He was abandoned on the streets of Toronto, so I took him in. My life? My parents? My siblings? My life is.. just.. boring. It's plain. My parents are old and they don't love each other. I don't even have siblings. I'm an only child. So basically — my life is a big bottle of boring compared to yours."

"I think your life is better than mine," he whispered, his hand submerging from the bag of chips. "I sleep, I wake up, I get ready for the concert. I do the concert. I travel to a new place, a new home. I haven't stayed so long in one place except here. I had to practically beg my manager, Scooter, and my Mom for this trip. For this vacation."

"And you spent it trying to show me how much of a good guy you really are," I whispered guiltily.

"It's not your fault. I made the bet. And it's not like it's torture. You're a likable girl when you're not angry," he joked, the smile implanted on his face an open one where you could see all his perfectly shaped teeth.

"What are your hopes and dreams? What did you want to be other than.. this?"

"I wanted to be a hockey player."

"You could be one. I believe you could be one. You know, like, like Sidney.. Croxby? Wait that doesn't sound..-"

Suddenly, my heart lunged out of my chest and a guttural squeak escaped me when his lips coincided with mine. It was a soft kiss. A heart pounding, unforgettable kiss that made my toes curl out of excitement. When he pulled away, his eyes didn't flutter open and give me the pleasure of seeing the delicate hazel that drifted around his cornea like a pond.

"People always have asked me what I wanted to be other than being an artist. And I'd tell them — a hockey player. But none of them ever told me I could be one. None of them told me that they believed I could be that. Except you."

"You can be anything you want," I mumbled, resting my flushed cheek against my palm. "And if you want to be a hockey player, who am I to say you can't be one? You could be as good as Sidney Croxby.."

"I like your eyes. They aren't the usual light blue. They're dark, like navy, but yet they're kind of light, too." While he deciphered my eyes, he unintentionally grasped my free hand, playing with my nimble fingers with his that had a monarchy of band aids binding after one another in a line across his knuckles and bruised fingers.

"Let's compare," he pried my hand back to his, connecting his palm with my clammy one. My fingers reached the middle of his while the sun casted a ray of light in between the spaces in our hands, a shadow of our hands appearing on the wall opposite of the window.

"I'll be like Sidney Crosby while you defend people in court. We'll live in a big house with a picket fence, little Parvati's running around the front yard with the golden retriever Rocky," Justin whispered, looking at our hands interestingly.

"Do we have to have a dog? I like cats better."

On day twenty two, we just talked. Talked. In bed. With a half full bag of chips. We talked about our dreams, our hopes, and my future that unfortunately — didn't seem to have him.